An English Major's Dream

College-aged individuals bustle around the English and Humanities building and basically run from room to room with a program in their hands. Rhetoric, stories, authors, and publishing each paint the picture of what two days of presentations entail. English Symposium at Brigham Young University, unexperienced by the majority of outside world (and most of BYU campus as well), is the epitome of English Majors as they relish in the art of the English language.

I am one of those English students that ran from class to class excitedly with a love of all things English and what that entailed. While I wish I could have attended every session and presentation of Brigham Young University's English Symposium, I only had the privilege of attending two presentations.

The first was called "Rhetorical Training as Leadership Training." Three presentations were given in regards to leadership applied in theatre in the classroom, rhetoric in business, and leadership in the home. Each presentation contained a curriculum outline specific to their topic. As an English Teaching major, the presentation that rang true with me was the leadership in theatre in the classroom. Meredith Campbell, the presenter, had intense focus on the needs of the students while still having application to rhetoric. Rhetoric, as explained at the beginning of the presentation, is more than language used to persuade but rather "combined speech, action, and thought used to discern and communicate consistent truth." Meredith's use of activity with Jr. High School students to elicit said rhetoric was intriguing. She outlines movement and character activities that would help each student recognize expectations and morals that were both required of them as well as hoped by them. The idea of rhetoric as a moral and overall driving motivation was a new concept to me that allowed me to see rhetoric in a different way. 

The second presentation, entitled "Creative Writing: Undergraduate Nonfiction Winners", was a large contrast to the first presentation. Instead of a power-point and presentation style session, it was a reading of stories and Q&A panel. The stories were very intriguing and allowed me to recognize that Nonfiction writing is not all textbook-like. Charlotte Shurtz, the first place winner of the Carroll Essay contest, told of the struggles of immigrants, refugees, and deported individuals striving to live in the USA. The writing was clear and yet emotion-packed. As we moved into the Q&A portion, I asked if these essay winners had written with the intent of moving their audience in the form that they did. Charlotte was the only one of three presenters that had had that intention in mind from the beginning. It seems that intention allows more clarity and less artificial emotion to be discovered in a final piece. 

Overall, the English Symposium was quite an enjoyable experience, especially for an English Major like me. Now if only every BYU student and individual living in Provo felt the same way.